two dimensions

Can you empty yourself onto an empty page in hopes of finding or losing yourself there?

Anything just to fill the space and unleash the inmate words from the mind's jail cell

Desperately making words appear out of nowhere, black on white, grasping at the thoughts as they fly by, unconscious, and forcing them to say something.

Having just a few makes me feel relieved to see something there, something tangible that might make sense of the nonsense that bounces and rattles in my brain, and then they grow to something bigger- something that tells me I’m not crazy after all; In fact, quite the opposite.
If I can find an audience for these festering bullshit words, I can convince someone, or more than one that I’m smart; or brilliant even.

Or at least not crazy. I'll settle for sane.

* * *

I walk back home, hoping to shake them, but they keep following me, these two goons. Depression has a firm hand on my shoulder and Loneliness harangues me with his interrogation. I don't even bother eating dinner; I don't want them watching me. I don't want to let them up the stairs to my apartment, either, but I know Depression, and he's got a billy club, so there's no stopping him from coming in if he decides that he wants to.

"It's not fair for you to come here," I tell Depression. "I paid you off already. I served my time.."

But he just gives me that dark smile, settles into my favorite chair, puts his feet on my table and lights a cigar, filling the place with his awful smoke. Loneliness watches and sighs, then climbs into my bed and pulls the covers over himself, fully dressed, shoes and all. He's going to make me sleep with him again tonight, I just know it.

~E. Gilbert "Eat, Pray, Love"

* * *

the universe asks..

What will you do with the silence.

What will you make in the spaces.

What will you create with the margins in life that are big enough to allow for error?

Now how will you share that with the world?

* * *

words

I write to untwist the worlds in my head. And separate the swirls of shadows from the depths of the closets of my mind.

I write to make piles of grey where there was a black world and a white one separated by minds.

I'm building something out of the mess of my mind; creating things, making sense of it all.

I write to put words to everything. Building, sustaining, creating.

Only with words could all this be possible.

Words are the basis, the sustainer for the creation of life. Now choose them.

* * *

moment

This past year has been, in many respects, pure hell. The good thing being

that I'm no longer afraid of hell anymore; I've already been there and back and

all I've got to show for it is tons and tons of pure unadulterated character. The

kind of character you get when you and your inner badass have made very close friends.

***

Life's Rough Drafts.

The longer I’ve lived, the more I look back amazed that I am still here, after every big and little mountain that seemed insurmountable.

And I learned I could make it through and live even when I didn’t feel like it at all. Why not keep living when you’ve lived long enough to know that good people exist and anything is always possible.

And the whole time the roller coaster of life goes up and down, sometimes down a little too fast and far; there might be something good just around the corner, up the next hill. Maybe a laugh or two, or a really good friend that gets you.

There is room for improvement and there always will be, as evolution coincides with ego and the fight for power and survival. Just try to be glad to be alive and having a good time sometimes. You can always look back and laugh at all the crazy shit you survived, all on your own. Be happy to live in an interesting world and to be part of something bigger, if not more flawed than yourself- the universe.

Funny how after the lens of time lapses, thing don't seem so bad.

* * *

escape

Reality makes me older
Need escape to get through.
Its all okay
everyone else does, too.

There's not much I understand
But because you're just like me

I do kinda get you.

***

muffled

I was staring out the window

The whole time he was talking to me

It was a filthy pane of glass I couldn't get a clear view

As he went on and on

It wasn't the outside world I could see

Just the filthy pane that I was looking through

So I had to break the window

It just had to be

Better that I break the window

Than him or her or me

-fiona apple.

***

no good day.

When all the consquences seem to be punishing you and working against you.
When your boss, like every one before him, makes you feel like an idiot.
When you walk into a drain spout knocking your glasses off and producing a three inch knot on your head.
When you check your bank account to realize a forgotten check processed causing hundreds in overdraft fees.
When you go home alone and talk to your pet about your woes.
When you have to negotiate with yourself to get out of bed, and its hard just to put one foot in front of the other.
When the whole world seems happier, more settled, more 'together' than you.

Just remember that you're not the only one. Not by a longshot.

* * *

want.

the basilica of sorrows, chicago

Here, the neighborhoods of rich and poor butt right up against each other like a schizophrenic patchwork quilt. This past week I have firsthand witnessed the unhappiness of both; the needing and the needing of a little more. Crossing the border from one to the next is like witnessing night and day in the blink of an eye. Just like that, I am needy one moment and feeling greedy the next.

If happiness is having, then it will always be relative to another's. It isn't resources and rewards or the having of a little more that determines it. It is the way we choose to perceive, and which corner we are doing the perceiving upon.
What side of the street are we standing on when we compare our lives.

***

eclipse

eclipse viewing, chicago

One time I asked the universe why it conspired to keep me alone. It answered back in its own silent way. And basically told me this, "because it's good for you, and because you can think better and maybe that's all you need right now."

Yea, me and the universe are tight like that..

moon, chicago

***

just write

I would so much rather be a photographer and speak in images rather than bare my soul in words, but taking pictures doesn't heal like spelling my thoughts out in sentences. It isn't something I choose to do anymore, it is something I have to.

***

freeze frame

blue M , Chicago

One thing you can do while living inside the arctic tundra in dead of winter;

Go outside and take pictures of the ice.

winter boots, chicago

And also, wear lots of layers ..

***

the good stuff

chocolate heaven, by way of chicago

In a society where things aren't as they should be, and people are alienated and disposable, let us remember that the things that are both priceless and worth something we give to ourselves. And that there's chocolate around every corner.

Thank god ...

***

incomplete.

I often wonder if my unfinished sentences and incomplete thoughts could write there own volumes.

***

Need

Everyone's an expert at pretending, but few are good at being real. It's difficult to know how much self-protection to carry, when everyone walks around concealing there's.
Everyone's your friend when there's some kinda benefits. Everyone's a lost soul, too, just like you.

And everything's okay. .

These are the things I've learned today.


***

Lost..

Big City, Chicago

As a child I loved the feeling of being lost. I would slip on the hand-me-down sneakers and set off into the woods surrounding our house on 4 sides. Hopping from rock to rock, I stopped to rest and explore only when no longer recognizing which direction to walk towards home.

Being lost simply felt more magical to me than knowing exactly where I was or being in a place I'd already been. It was how I discovered the purple forest, the vine swing, the back edge of the fenced-in horse pasture where I'd sit and pet noses for hours- or minutes that may have seemed like hours.

As I got bigger, it got harder and harder to get lost and feel that magic again. The minutes would pass more slowly, the creek grew smaller and smaller, and I always knew which direction was home and it was too closeby to feel the magic.

Today, I still love that feeling of being lost between big scary buildings or endless forest trees. It's why I'll land in a city without a guidebook, wishing only to wander and not to navigate. People never understood why I did this; but I simply enjoy the way it feels.

And I guess this is why, because of the magic.

***

we the consumers.

glass on sill, chai-cago

Can they also make a printer a perfect square, not a rectangle? A rectangle fits nowhere, hello? Can things curve instead of corners and straight?
And laptops too, can we get those in circles and squares,

or at least agree to banish the rectangle for good? And wires, too?
And can I get that in blue?

***

morning, sunshine

too early, chicago.

If women ruled the world, would things make more sense to me?

Would they open the express lanes and ban cell phones, lane changing, and obnoxious taxicab-driving around O'hare.
Would there be a spot for my purse and bottle of water built into every car, instead of a giant gearshaft and a cup holder that doesn't fit anything I own?

Would the inside of my hood light up and come with dipsticks neatly labeled and color-coded?

I mean who wants to feel around inside a dirty hot engine with bare hands, in heels, in the snow? I've done it, builds character, makes me hate life at the time. And men who design such nonsense.

***